THE MASQUE OF RED DEATH (1964)

 

(Director: Roger Corman. Screenwriter: Charles Beaumont and R. Wright Campbell.).

Storyline

While the Red Plague stalks the peasantry, a cruel prince and his fellow deviants shelter in his castle.

Review

Based on Edgar Allan Poe’s story, MASQUE is an excellent, possibly perfect film, from R. Wright Campbell and Charles Beaumont’s tightly penned script, its top-notch acting, its vivid, symbolic splays of colors and lighting, to producer Roger Corman’s waste-no-shots directing. (If Beaumont’s name sounds familiar, he was a staff writer on the original 1959-64 TWILIGHT ZONE series.)

MASQUE stars include: Vincent Price (THE TINGLER, 1959) as the cruel Prospero; Hazel Court, who played opposite Price in THE RAVEN (1963) and whose last film was an uncredited role (“Champagne Woman at Hunt”) in THE FINAL CONFLICT (1981); Patrick Magee, as an envious, toady-like Alfredo─two of his later films include A CLOCKWORK ORANGE (1971) and THE BLACK CAT (1981); and an uncredited JohnWestbrook as Man in Red (a.k.a. the Red Death); Westbrook also appeared in THE TOMB OF LIGEIA (1964). Be sure to look for the background/visual cue callbacks to earlier Corman/Price films, THE RAVEN and THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM (1961)!